I think it’s a good thing to push for more civic participation in general. From professional experience, unfortunately, people tend to be a lot less interested, still, in general attempts at this: it’s usually only the people with vested interests or stakes into whatever’s being handled
ie in a case of ‘what should we do with this one square in this neighbourhood’, young families that might want a nice place for children to safely play in won’t show up, but a few elderly residents afraid of nosie complaints might, and then the only input from attempts at getting people more engaged with their community and local governance is very one-sided
Ultimately I think you should always vote for what you personally consider the best option for what you believe. That is what voting is. Even if its a smaller candiate. Smaller ones will also never get bigger if people fear voting for them.
My issue is primarily people who don’t vote at all, because that does only serve the worst.
Sounds like they shouldn’t be taking up seats and political power/representation then! They are, for their woes or not, part of the system whilst the work to unify Ireland into a whole continues meaningfully on in the background (despite everyone insisting Britain is somehow magically keeping them apart atm when the opposite is true). They could do something with that power, even if they feel dismayed to be part of the system at all, but dissenting against democracy and not doing your civil duty as a representative in Westminster isn’t it.
It’s one of misunderstanding that largely undermines and weakens the argument of people against a policy proposal fashioned by people that clearly know what they’re doing
It doesn’t lead to right wing populsit movements gaining power: it’s the same rhetoric used by them
horrible system, I can easily agree with that
Because otherwise, the only people that vote are the ones that are inspired by a particular candidate, and I think in the modern political environment, the ‘exciting’ candidates, by and large, tend to be the worst by far.
As said, I think its nice and got nothing against it. It was just that it felt or feels a little off if people expect something in return for them voting.
Divine’s political views were and are the only valid ones. We really should kill everyone now, condone first degree murder, advocate cannibalism and eat doo doo.
I am so serious when I say we need to bring back the concept of Civic Duty in everyday life. It is so incredibly tragic what councils and local/regional governments get away with purely because they’re entirely staffed and manned by people who are almost always 60+ looking for an easy grasp at power and to maintain an objectively bad standard because its the status quo they know.
Unfortunately it requires younger participants which is incredibly difficult to achieve, especially in today’s world where the young participants are either working, desperately trying to afford homes or simply dealing with other daily problems that the time for Civic Duty does not exist. But its becoming increasingly relevant and required which is why I am deeply pro-digitization of local/regional council and government decisions to allow young people’s voices to be heard electronically.
